Snowden leaks accelerated adoption of encryption by 7 years, U.S. intel chief says

Edward Snowden‘s whistleblowing on global surveillance has rapidly hastened mainstream adoption of strong encryption, according to the U.S. government’s top intelligence official.

“As a result of the Snowden revelations, the onset of commercial encryption has accelerated by seven years,” Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told reporters at a breakfast hosted by Christian Science Monitor on Monday morning. Clapper said his comment was based on analysis by the National Security Agency.

Asked whether he viewed the increased adoption of encryption as positive, Clapper said it was not.

This year, the Daily Dot looked at 10 of the best privacy tools available to the public. Many involve encryption, and all of them are gaining in popularity likely due to the debate sparked in large part by Snowden.

While more users have adopted encryption because of Snowden, developers and coders have also been creating more encryption tools because of Snowden. The encrypted email service ProtonMail, for example, specifically cites Snowden as an influence and inspiration.

Clapper also said on Monday that he was evaluating “several options” to publicly release how many U.S. persons were watched in Internet surveillance intended for foreign targets.

Those comments came in response to a letter from a bipartisan group of 14 lawmakers who said they need “hard facts” on American surveillance “in order that we may properly evaluate these programs.”

Clapper spoke on Monday at an event hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

Patrick Howell O'Neill is a notable cybersecurity reporter whose work has focused on the dark net, national security, and law enforcement. A former senior writer at the Daily Dot, O'Neill joined CyberScoop in October 2016.
I am a cybersecurity journalist at CyberScoop. I cover the security industry, national security and law enforcement.